Romanesk v. Rose

Horney, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In this tort action tried in Maryland under Virginia law for personal injuries received by a guest passenger riding in an automobile operated by the owner, the question on appeal is whether there was sufficient evidence of gross negligence to allow the jury to determine whether the plaintiff-appellee was entitled to recover damages from the defendant-appellant. In the early evening of a day in mid-January of 1965, the appellant, Richard A. Romanesk, accompanied by his wife, the appellee, Margo D. Rose, and Guy S. Pizzuto, drove from Palmer, Maryland, to a housewarming party in Arlington, Virginia. The party continued until about 1:30 a.m. the next day.

The appellee had two or three glasses of champagne during the party and the appellant had a glass of champagne and three highballs. None of the group was intoxicated. After the party broke up, the appellant ate breakfast with the host. Between 2:30 and 3 :00 a.m. the two couples left for the return trip, the Romanesks (the husband driving) in the front seat and the two passengers seated in the rear of the automobile.

At the trial, Margo Rose testified that they left Washington Street, went down a hill and turned right to get onto Arlington Boulevard. Although she dozed off at once, she remembered hearing a noise and feeling bumps but recalled nothing else until she awoke in a hospital. Guy Pizzuto testified that the appellant stopped at a blinking red light at the intersection of Nash Street and Arlington Road and that when Romanesk got on the main highway he accel ⁴²² erated quickly up to what he estimated to be “sixty or seventy miles an hour” in a thirty-five mile zone. He further stated that he had leaned forward to ask the driver to reduce his speed when the automobile slowed down and it seemed to him that “we were trying to make a turn or something” and that when the driver tried to slow he reduced his speed to “fifty or fifty-five miles an hour” and veered off the road and struck an embankment on the edge before the automobile struck a concrete abutment.

The roadway where the accident occurred was unlighted. Both sides of the road were being reconstructed and torch-topped barrels 1 were spaced along the edges of the roadway. There was a road sign — Washington Next Right — and a break in the line of barrels immediately before the automobile reached the point of impact. At the close of the case for the plaintiff, the defendant moved for a directed verdict but the trial court declined to rule on the motion at that time.

Richard Romanesk admitted that the accident occurred in a thirty-five mile zone, but denied that Pizzuto had correctly estimated his speed. He testified that he had been misled by the sign and the break in the line of barrels to believe that the road turned off where he attempted to turn; that he struck several of the barrels and knocked them into the gully; that as he left the paved portion of the roadway he saw a deep drop before him; and that he accelerated the motor and turned his wheels to the left to prevent the automobile from dropping over the embankment but could not avoid striking the abutment of the overpass. The automobile was almost completely demolished. When the defendant renewed the motion for a directed verdict at the close of all the evidence, it was denied.

The motion for a new trial or in the alternative for a judgment n.o.v. was also denied. Since the accident occurred in Virginia, it is governed by the law of that state which has a guest statute providing in pertinent part— ⁴²³ “No person transported by the owner or operator of any motor vehicle as a guest without payment for such transportation * * * shall be entitled to recover damages against such owner or operator for * * * injuries to the person or property of such guest resulting from the operation of such motor vehicle, unless such * * * injury was caused or resulted from the gross negligence or willful and wanton disregard of the safety of the person or property of the person being so transported on the part of such owner or operator.” Code of Virginia, Vol. 2, § 8-646.1 (1950). Gross negligence is defined in 4 Blashfield, Cyclopedia of Automobile Law and Practice, § 2771 (1946 ed.) as— “an intentional failure to perform a manifest duty in reckless disregard of the consequences as affecting the life or property of another, and also implies a thoughtless disregard of the consequences without the exertion of any effort to avoid them. Stated conversely, a wrongdoer is guilty of gross negligence or acts wantonly and willfully only when he inflicts injury intentionally or is so utterly indifferent to the rights of others that he acts as if such rights did not exist.” For cases applying this definition to guest